8 Weeks of Self-Employment and a Trip to Italy
My First 8 Weeks of Self-Employment
Resigning from my full-time job in early April left me equal parts emotionally exhausted and excited for the future. For the first few days, I just wanted to sleep. But, when Monday rolled around I found it easy to start my workday routine like normal.
Sitting down to work that first day as a now self-employed human was a little different than the weeks, months, and years prior, though.
On that first day, I sat down and didn’t think about what I had to work on, but what I wanted to work on.
Wild.
Obviously there will be things that I have to work on, but don’t want to. However, now I feel a stronger sense of ownership and empowerment.
Before, my creative projects were squeezed into evenings and weekends around other life events and necessities including mental recovery time from my full-time job. Now, the whole workday is my designated creative project time. It’s a massive shift for me.
My evenings and weekends are becoming more relaxed, because I feel less pressure to maximize creative productivity during my “time off”. I find the whole thing fascinating and am still getting used to the changes.
During my first few weeks of self-employment, I focused on project management/organization (using Notion for this), edited videos for Travel Atmos, wrote a portion of a future travel guide I’ll be releasing, started Boreal Soup, witnessed the incredible aurora for the first time (in Iowa, of all places!), and finalized our first ever trip to Italy (more on that below).
The month of May was a whirlwind! We spent a week exploring a sliver of northern Italy, came back home to recover from jetlag and catch up on a little bit of work, and then we were off on an extended weekend trip to Arizona for a wedding.
Now, we are settling in at home for the (hot Iowa) summer.
I am really looking forward to having a few months here at home to focus on projects before we set off on our next travel adventure (any guesses?).
Our First Trip to Italy
Ahhh, Italy. A land of rich history, delicious food and wine, and stunning landscapes.
We booked this trip to Italy several months ago, before we knew that I’d be leaving my job. What a way to celebrate this new phase!
Unlike most of our trips where we are hopping from place to place trying to see a little bit of everything, we had one home base for this one. That home base was Milan, Italy.
There are so many incredible places to visit in Italy. We chose Milan as our home base because of its interesting architecture, museums, proximity to the mountains, and the fact that there was a direct flight from Chicago available. For our first time in Italy, Milan worked out perfectly.
We stayed in an apartment that was 2 blocks from the city center, near the impressive and historic Duomo di Milano. Our location was a short walking distance to many restaurants and points of interest. We also had easy access to the train system to get around and out of the city.
Our first few days were spent exploring historic churches, museums, and pretty streets in Milan.
Then, we left the city on day trips to Venice and Varenna! Although we really enjoyed what Milan had to offer, Venice and Varenna were our favorites.
In the upcoming weeks, I will be sharing photos and detailed highlights of our week in Italy. These will be divided into 3 separate posts:
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Have you been to Italy? What do you want to know about our week in Italy?
Until next time,
Stephanie
Where else can you follow me & some of my projects?
Photography & Travel: @stephcoffmanphoto (Instagram)
Print Shop: StephCoffmanPhoto on Etsy
Nature films: @travelatmos (Instagram, YouTube)